The family of a Colombian fisherman has claimed that the US government illegally killed him when it launched an attack with a military ship in September.

Alejandro Carranza was killed on September 15 when his ship was attacked in a US military anti-narcotics campaign. On Tuesday, Carranza’s family filed a formal complaint against the US government before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR).

The complaint alleges that Carranza was simply fishing when his boat was targeted in the deadly attack. His family said there were no drugs on his boat.

“We know that Pete Hegseth, Secretary of Defense of the United States, was responsible for ordering the bombing of vessels such as those of Alejandro Carranza Medina and the murder of all those who were aboard said vessels,” the complaint says.

Carmela Medina and Alejandro Carranza, parents of Alejandro Carranza, a Colombian who reportedly died when the United States bombed a ship supposedly transporting drugs in the Caribbean, pose for a photo at their home in Santa Marta on October 21, 2025.
Carmela Medina and Alejandro Carranza, parents of Alejandro Carranza, a Colombian who reportedly died when the United States bombed a ship supposedly transporting drugs in the Caribbean, pose for a photo at their home in Santa Marta on October 21, 2025.

MARCO PERDOMO via Getty Images

So far, more than 80 people have been killed by US attacks in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific. Hegseth and President Donald Trump’s administration have argued that extrajudicial killings target drug smugglers.

The same month Carranza was killed, Hegseth ordered back-to-back attacks on a Venezuelan ship off the coast of Trinidad, The Washington Post reported.

The act has been described as a war crime, and Hegseth has pivoted to blame the second attack on Joint Special Operations Command Admiral Frank Bradley.

While Trump has claimed that these targeted ships are transporting deadly drugs such as fentanyl to the US, he has offered no evidence and many of the ships in question are too small and ill-equipped to travel to the US.

Carranza’s wife, Katerine Hernández, told News that her husband was a “good man” who went out on the day of his death to fish for his family.

“Why did they take his life like that?” he asked an News journalist. “The fisherman has the right to live. Why wasn’t he arrested?”

While Trump has boasted about killing suspected “narcoterrorists,” he recently released from prison former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández, who was serving a 45-year sentence for his role in helping drug traffickers move hundreds of tons of cocaine into the United States.

Trump defended pardoning the convicted drug trafficker.

“They basically said he was a drug dealer because he was the president of the country,” Trump said. “And they said it was a setup by the Biden administration. And I looked at the facts and I agreed with them.”